John Ivison: Ottawa’s new ‘pragmatic diplomacy’ policy misfires at the UN

2023/11/15 Leave a comment

Embarrassing that the government couldn’t vote in favour of UN resolution condemning the Israeli settlements in the West Bank as obstacles to peace as they clearly are with their ongoing expansion. Good critique by Ivison:

If “pragmatic diplomacy” is a real, breathing strategy, then the vote to censure illegal settlements in the West Bank would have been a pragmatic and diplomatic start.

Source: John Ivison: Ottawa’s new ‘pragmatic diplomacy’ policy misfires at the UN

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COVID-19 Immigration Effects – September 2023 update

2023/11/15 Leave a comment

Regular monthly data update.

Of particular note this month is the drastic drop in the number of temporary residents transitioning to permanent residency and a an equally sharp decrease in the number admitted under IMP.

Asylum claimants continue to increase.

The number of new citizens rose sharply.

Highlights on slide 3.

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Canadians are turning against immigration. Labour economist Mikal Skuterud on how to reform the system and reverse this trend

2023/11/14 Leave a comment

Usual insightful comments by Skuterud:

Canada has long been an outlier in the Western world for having the rare dynamic of both high levels of immigration and high levels of public support for immigration. Paired with cross-partisan support on the topic, the issue has not been a major driving factor of the country’s politics. But that consensus may be changing. New data from the Canadian Century Initiative finds that there has been a significant increase in Canadians who believe that Canada has too much immigration.

Mikal Skuterud, a labour economist at the University of Waterloo and director of the Canadian Labour Economics Forum, offers his expertise on the topic in an exclusive exchange with The Hub’s editor-at-large, Sean Speer. He breaks down the numbers and highlights the ways Canada can reform its system to reverse these trends and better serve the country as a whole.

SEAN SPEER: As you know, the Canadian Century Initiative, a non-profit organization dedicated to the goal of raising Canada’s population to 100 million by 2100 through large-scale immigration, recently released new polling in conjunction with the Environics Institute for Survey Research. I want to start by asking for your reaction to the survey’s top-line finding. There has been a significant increase—indeed, the largest year-over-year increase since Environics started asking this question in 1977—in the percentage of respondents who believe that Canada has too much immigration. What do you think about this result? Are you surprised? And what do you think is behind it?

MIKAL SKUTERUD: While Canadians have always been, and continue to be, overwhelmingly open to immigration, opinion polls have long shown that a significant majority of Canadians believe the number of immigrants Canada accepts should be limited. I think this reflects a widespread belief that while immigration has the potential to boost average economic well-being in the population, there is a limit to that potential. The vast majority of Canadians understand that the economy has an absorptive capacity. When the population grows faster than the housing stock, public infrastructure, and business capital, there is less capital per person, and this tends to lower labour productivity and average economic living standards in the population. My best guess is that the shifting sentiments that Environics is seeing in their polling reflect concerns that the government’s ambitious immigration agenda is pushing up against the economy’s absorptive capacity. 

SEAN SPEER: The biggest explanation for the increase in the public’s misgivings about immigration is the perceived effect on housing prices. This ought to have been a predictable concern among policymakers and the Canadian Century Initiative itself. Why do you think we failed to account for housing demand and the need for greater supply in conjunction with raising immigration levels? What can be done to improve jurisdictional coordination and coherence on these issues? 

MIKAL SKUTERUD: In 2015, an economic narrative surfaced in this country that claimed heightened immigration rates, from what were already high rates when compared to other OECD countries, would be a tonic for economic growth. Canadians were told that higher population growth would not only make Canada more prosperous but that higher immigration was necessary for economic growth. For economists like me, who have been studying the economics of Canadian immigration for decades, these hyperbolic claims did not line up with the predictions of standard economic models of economic growth or with the Canadian empirical evidence. 

In March 2016, then Minister of Immigration, John McCallum, invited a group of us to share our views. In retrospect, it’s clear that our concerns fell on deaf ears. The immigration narrative was a feel-good story, and nobody likes a cold shower. The appeal of the narrative that immigration—“Canada’s secret sauce”—could be the solution to our dismal economic growth and labour productivity performance is understandable. But, of course, sometimes political narratives are so appealing that well-intentioned people get caught up in the warm feelings of what we’d like to be true and lose sight of the more important question of what is true. 

If we know nothing else about the economics of immigration, we know that immigration has distributional effects. In general, the folks who are on the opposite side of consumer and producer markets of immigrants stand to benefit, while folks on the same side are likely to experience adverse economic effects. While recent immigrants who live in the same communities as newcomers face heightened competition for housing and jobs, the competitive pressures facing sellers in mortgage markets (banks) and buyers in labour markets (employers) are alleviated. 

An interesting result from the recent Environics poll which I haven’t heard any media report on is that the biggest shift in dissatisfaction with recent immigration levels is among first-generation immigrants. This is consistent with the proposition that population growing pains are likely felt most by immigrants already here. To the extent that we care about the consequences of heightened immigration on economic inequality and social cohesion, these distributional effects should be of first-order concern to policymakers. 

SEAN SPEER: One of the issues that, according to the polling, is the subject of declining public confidence is the notion that we need or want a larger population itself. A lot of the immigration debate is implicitly motivated by the idea that we should aspire to a fast-growing and larger population. What is your view on this question? What does the scholarship tell us about the benefits of bigness? Should we have an explicit goal for Canada’s population to become larger?

MIKAL SKUTERUD: The economic case for bigness is most often made with reference to what economists call “agglomeration effects.” The general idea is that bigger cities with higher population densities are more successful in generating the flows of knowledge and ideas that result in innovation, and in turn, technological advances, and growth in total factor productivity. This mechanism could, in theory, be a source of increasing returns to scale, such that a two percent increase in the inputs that go into producing aggregate output, most importantly the labour input, result in a more than two percent increase in aggregate output. In this way, an increase in the immigration rate can produce an increase in GDP per capita. 

Unfortunately, I’m unaware of any credible evidence that this mechanism has been important in recent Canadian history. Certainly, the current push to settle more immigrants in remote communities works against this mechanism. In work with my colleague Joel Blit and recent Ph.D. student Jue Zhang, we examined the relationship between inflows of university-educated immigrants into Canadian cities to the number of new patents created in those cities and found no evidence consistent with the proposition that agglomeration effects have been quantitively important for Canada historically, in contrast to the results of a similar analysis using U.S. data. 

Perhaps a more compelling argument for why population size is, in itself, a sound economic objective is that bigger countries have more geopolitical influence on the world stage and that this advantage somehow benefits economic growth through more advantageous free trade deals, for example. However, if this mechanism was quantitatively important, we’d expect countries with larger populations to be on average richer, but the opposite is true. World Bank data from 187 countries in 2019 shows that the correlation between national population and GDP per capita is unambiguously negative. Many big countries are poor, and many small countries are rich. 

SEAN SPEER: One of the most interesting results is that 77 percent of respondents said that government policy should prioritize high-skilled immigration. Only one-third said that it should prioritize low-skilled workers and students. Yet as your work has shown, government policy has tilted away from high-skilled immigration to the latter two categories in recent years. How does one explain that dissonance and what should be done to rebalance the composition of Canada’s different immigration streams? 

MIKAL SKUTERUD: The repair to the permanent immigration system is simple: return to a single pathway for economic-class immigration with a single selection criterion. This is what we had in Canada before 2021. All economic-class immigrants (outside Quebec) received permanent residency status by entering the Express Entry pool where they were assigned a Comprehensive Ranking System (CRS) score, which is essentially a prediction of the applicants’ future earnings in Canada. Every two weeks, IRCC announced a CRS cutoff score and candidates with scores above the cutoff were invited to apply for PR status. 

However, since 2021 IRCC has introduced a series of ad-hoc TR-to-PR pathway programs intended to provide PR pathways for applicants with low CRS scores. For example, in April 2021, they announced a new PR pathway for 90,000 temporary workers employed in a list of “essential occupations” that included cashiers, cleaners, truck drivers, construction and farm labourers, and security guards. More recently, the Category-Based Selection System has been introduced allowing the minister of the day to bypass the CRS criterion to prioritize any occupation in the applicant pool. This flexibility enables the Minister to respond to business lobbying pressure for more low-skilled labour. This politicization of immigrant selection isn’t good for wage growth in Canada’s low-skilled workforce and undermines business incentives to invest in training and technologies to improve labour productivity. 

The question of whether immigration should be focused on raising the average human capital stock of the population or plugging holes in current labour markets is longstanding. Economists have overwhelmingly argued for the former approach. Their logic is simply that we don’t believe planned economies work well. There is overwhelming evidence that aggregate production in modern economies doesn’t require some fixed ratio of labour types. In 1921, one-third of Canada’s workers were employed in agriculture. After more than 100 years of innovation in farming equipment, less than two percent are. Trying to predict where job vacancies will be in five or ten years is futile because labour demand is endogenous to labour supply. Where a particular labour type is plentiful, wages will be low, incentivizing employment of those types, and where a labour type is scarce, wages will increase, incentivizing substitution to other types of labour or capital investments. If we want a low-wage low-skill economy, we should target low-skill immigrants; but if we want a high-skill high-wage economy, we should prioritize high-skill immigrants. 

SEAN SPEER: More generally, if you were advising government policymakers on their policy response to these findings, what might change? Should we lower our permanent resident target? Should we prioritize addressing the growth in non-PR streams? Should we do both? What is the Skuterud plan to restore public support for high levels of immigration?  

MIKAL SKUTERUD: A positive outcome of the growth in Canada’s foreign student and temporary foreign worker populations is it has justified a call for better data. Statistics Canada now publishes a quarterly data series on the overall size of Canada’s non-permanent (NPR) population. This population is exceptionally difficult to measure but they have taken a good shot at it. What the data show is that Canada’s NPR population increased from 1.5 million to 2.2 million—a nearly 50 percent increase—between July 2022 and July 2023. 

As the NPR population grows faster than the number of new PR entries, an increasing number of temporary residents who came to Canada with dreams of settling permanently will find their permits expiring before they’ve made the transition. This inevitably means that Canada’s undocumented population will grow. A growing undocumented population is undesirable for many reasons, so rebalancing growth in Canada’s NPR population with the growth in Canada’s PR targets should be, in my view, a first-order priority for IRCC. 

At the core of the challenge here are two realities. First, Canadian permanent residency status holds enormous economic value to huge populations of individuals around the world. Second, Canadian immigration policy has over the past decade shifted in a significant way to “two-step immigration” in which the pathway to PR status is to study or work in Canada as a temporary resident and then clear the hurdles of the PR admission system. Together these realities mean that a key factor in migrants’ private cost-benefit decisions to come to Canada is their perception of the likelihood of making a successful TR-to-PR transition while in Canada. 

While increasing TR-to-PR pathways for migrants may be well-intentioned, an unintended consequence of these programs is they increase the odds that lower-skilled migrants will get lucky and obtain PR status. In this regard, they serve to lure migrants who are willing to pay exorbitant tuition fees to postsecondary institutions that offer little educational value and or accept jobs offering substandard wages and working conditions. There’s little doubt in my mind that an important cause of the tremendous growth in the NPR population is a supply-driven response to migrants’ perceptions that their chances of winning the PR lottery have increased in recent years. Fixing this problem requires returning to a single PR pathway that is transparent and predictable and that prioritizes applicants with the highest CRS scores. 

Source: Canadians are turning against immigration. Labour economist Mikal Skuterud on how to reform the system and reverse this trend

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ICYMI: More language resources needed for Canadian newcomers: experts

2023/11/14 Leave a comment

As they always do…:

As Ottawa unveils its immigration plan for 2024-26 this week, immigration experts say more resources are needed to help new permanent residents settle into life in Canada:

Immigration Minister Marc Miller announced Wednesday that Canada will not cut immigration levels and plans to hold its target of annual newcomers steady at 500,00 people starting in 2026.

“I was a little bit surprised that they didn’t reduce the numbers given the discourse that’s been going on in the public about too many immigrants coming, but I think it also speaks to the need that we have for newcomers to come here for all kinds of reasons,” Lori Wilkinson, a professor in the department of sociology and criminology at the University of Manitoba, told Global News.

…

Source: More language resources needed for Canadian newcomers: experts

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The Return of the ‘Useful Idiot’

2023/11/14 Leave a comment

Some history of the term “useful idiots” and its application to some groups and individuals in the Israel Hamas war:

The Hamas charter calls for killing all Jews (not just Israelis), so how could it be that there are Jewish groups, such as If Not Now and  Jewish Voice for Peace, who carry water for Hamas? Hamas and other Islamist groups punish gays with death, so why are there LGBTQ+ groups that are pro-Hamas? Given the way that Iran and Islamists treat women, why do some feminists back them?

The Jewish groups are the most perplexing. Placing the blame for the barbaric terrorist attack of October 7thsquarely on Israel, they are busy lobbying Congress to stop sending military aid. Anti-semitic harassment does not seem to concern them, and their rallies have led to headlines that surely make Hamas leaders gleeful: “Progressive Jewish Groups Blame Israeli ‘Apartheid’ for Hamas Violence” (Newsweek) and “Hundreds Arrested as US Jews Protest Against Israel’s Gaza Assault” (The Guardian) are but two examples.

This phenomenon is not new. Lenin supposedly called people of this sort “useful idiots” and, as the phrase suggests, he had utter contempt for them, especially the liberals of the Kadet (Constitutional Democratic) party. Although they did not themselves practice terrorism, the Kadets apologized for, even applauded, it. As with Hamas, Russian terrorists of the early 20th century reveled in cruelty. It was common to disfigure a person, often chosen at random, by throwing sulphuric acid in his face. Another favorite was to toss bombs laced with nails into a crowded café “to see how the foul bourgeois will squirm in death agony.” One group threw “traitors” into vats of boiling water.  As the leading scholar of Russian terrorism, Anna Geifman, explained, “the need to inflict pain was transformed from an abnormal irrational compulsion experienced by unbalanced personalities into a formally verbalized obligation for all revolutionaries,” as it apparently was for ISIS and is for Hamas.

How could the liberals have stomached such cruelty? Paul Milyukov, the Kadet leader, declared that “all means are now legitimate… and all means should be tried,” much as apologists for Hamas favor decolonization “by any means necessary,” including, it would seem, burning babies alive. Another Kadet official, asked to condemn such terrorism, famously replied: “Condemn terror?  That would be the moral death of our party!”

No sooner had Lenin seized power than the Bolsheviks proclaimed Kadets “outside the law,” which meant anything could be done to them. Right away two Kadet leaders were murdered in their hospital beds. Since Lenin made no secret of his plans—again, like Hamas—why did the liberals not oppose him? Even Russian capitalists contributed to the Bolsheviks and other parties sworn to destroy them!

As if not to be outdone by their Russian predecessors, some American liberals justified Stalin’s purges, the Gulag, and the starvation of millions of peasants. Other liberals objected, and so a split reminiscent of what seems to be developing today took place. Closer to our time, the radical gay cultural theorist Michel Foucault, whose ideas helped form the current academic ethos, came to back Ayatollah Khomeini. In short, we are witnessing a familiar pattern.

What explains it? What makes people useful idiots? It isn’t lack of intelligence. One is most likely to find useful idiots on the campuses of elite colleges and universities. Nor is it ignorance: Hamas is proud to broadcast its atrocities. So what then is it?

In his cycle of novels about the Russian Revolution, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn poses this very question. In one memorable scene, he describes the novel’s hero, Vorotyntsev, at a meeting of the Kadets. “They were all overwhelmingly certain that they were right, yet they needed these exchanges to reinforce their certainty,” he thinks.  And despite his better judgment, Vorotyntsev goes along with them as if he were hypnotized—not because he felt he was wrong, but out of fear of saying something reactionary.”  Today, many are unwilling to risk being called “conservative” or worse, not just to avoid the consequences that such a reputation might entail, but so as not to tarnish their sense of self, which is inextricably tied up with being on the progressive side of everything. At last, Vorotyntsev breaks free from ”the bewitchment” and speaks his mind. How wonderful it would be to get people to do the same in the present day.

Perhaps supporters of Hamas terror naively imagine that they will never find themselves the target of it. “There is reason to fear that the Revolution may, like Saturn, devour each of her children one by one,” declared the French revolutionary Pierre Verginaud at his trial, and it wasn’t long before the guillotine also claimed the revolutionaries who condemned him. Useful idiots need to use their heads before they lose their heads.

Source: The Return of the ‘Useful Idiot’

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French march against antisemitism shakes up far right and far left – BBC

2023/11/14 Leave a comment

Of note. Of course, the anti-immigration and xenophobic discourse of Le Pen is directed against Muslims, surprising omission from the article:

Something unprecedented is happening this weekend in Paris, brought about by the war between Israel and Hamas and its spill-over in Europe.

For the first time ever, a major demonstration being attended by representatives of the major political parties includes the far right – but not the far left.

On Sunday afternoon thousands of people heeded a call from the Speakers of the two houses of parliament to show their support for French “Republican” values and their rejection of antisemitism – this in the face of a steep rise in antisemitic actions since 7 October.

Among the first to announce their presence were Marine Le Pen, three-time presidential candidate for the National Rally (formerly the National Front), and the party’s young president, Jordan Bardella.

Almost simultaneously came a rejoinder from their counterpart on the far left, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, irascible leader of France Unbowed (LFI). His party would not be attending, he tweeted, because the march was a “rendezvous for unconditional supporters of the massacre [of Gazans]”.

Source: French march against antisemitism shakes up far right and far left – BBC

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CD Howe Institute: Higher immigration without business investment lowers Canadian living standards

2023/11/14 Leave a comment

Yet another voice questioning the government’s immigration strategy and policies given lack of business investment:

Immigration is driving a historic surge in Canada’s population. At the same time, Canadian wages and living standards are stagnant. That is a bad combination – and, worse, it is not a coincidence. And here’s the link: Business investment is so weak that the stock of productive capital per worker in Canada – the buildings, tools and software they use – is falling. More workers and less capital are putting Canada on a path to a low-productivity, low-wage economy.

…

William Robson is chief executive of the C.D. Howe Institute. He recently co-authored a report on business investment in Canada.

Source: Opinion: Higher immigration without business investment lowers … – The Globe and Mail

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Star editorial: Canada needs immigrants. It also needs a plan for the influx of new Canadians.

2023/11/13 Leave a comment

Even the Star is critical of the government’s approach to immigration.

Money quote: “On the larger immigration question it must come to grips with the reality that bigger isn’t always better when there’s no strategy.”

Marc Miller characterized it as a mere piece of housekeeping. Canadians were telling his Liberal government, he said, to “be a little more organized” and plan a little better when it comes to immigration policy.

But Canadian immigration policy needs a rethink, not just better organization. While the federal immigration minister rightly says Canadians are not xenophobic, they are paying more attention to immigration than they have in recent years. As Miller concedes, it’s time for the Trudeau government to pay more attention as well. It’s time to tailor the number of immigrants to our needs because in recent years Liberal immigration policy has been a set of numbers in search of a coherent strategy.

The numbers are not just big – they are historic.

Miller will stay the course for the life of his government, sticking to previously announced plans to welcome 485,000 permanent residents in 2024 and 500,000 in 2025, but will freeze that number for 2026. When the Liberals were elected in 2015, the immigration intake was set at 265,000 per year, but under its steadily increasing levels in non-pandemic years, 98 per cent of the country’s population increase now comes from international migration, Statistics Canada reports.

The real numbers eclipse permanent resident targets. Canada’s population hit 40 million last summer, part of the largest year-over-year percentage increase in population in 66 years, with the country on a path to double its population in 25 years. The 2.2 million non-permanent residents living in this country on July 1, 2023, comprised largely of temporary workers and international students, was up 46 per cent over the previous year. They now outnumber Indigenous Canadians.

Miller agrees his government has become “quite addicted” to temporary foreign workers and mused about capping the number of international students in this country, now estimated at 900,000. The temporary workers too often find abusive working conditions. Students are too often lured to private colleges with fraudulent claims only to receive substandard education and false hope.

Miller has promised renewed scrutiny on those issues, but the larger picture also needs greater scrutiny. Yes, we are getting older and workers are needed, including those who can fill what the government estimates is a shortfall of 100,000 needed to build homes. But those workers, too, need some place to live, adding more pressure on the market. The Liberal argument that growing immigration means a growing economy is also being questioned, because Canadians’ personal standard of living has not grown with an influx of new arrivals.

None of this is the fault of immigrants, temporary workers or international students. It is a fault of lack of government planning. Canadians facing financial stress are right to worry that a glut of workers available through immigration will drive down wages. They are correct to be concerned about more stress being put on the country’s health care system and social services. They have seen refugees sleeping on the streets in Toronto.

Canada’s worker to retiree ratio of three-to-one and a low birth rate will put greater stress on our social programs, necessitating the open-door policy, Miller says. He has begun work to better integrate federal policy with the needs of provinces who deliver services for newcomers and will upgrade services in smaller centres in the hope that more will settle outside Canada’s three largest cities. All this will take time.

A recent Environics and Century Initiative poll found 44 per cent of Canadians agreed to some degree that there was too much immigration in Canada, the largest one-year jump in that view since the annual survey started in 1977. Importantly, 42 per cent of respondents said immigrants made their community a better place and only nine per cent felt newcomers made things worse.

This country is indisputably enriched by immigrants. The Liberal government must guard against Canadians scapegoating immigrants as they face increased financial stress. It must get a handle on the ever-increasing number of temporary workers and international students in this country. On the larger immigration question it must come to grips with the reality that bigger isn’t always better when there’s no strategy.

Source: Canada needs immigrants. It also needs a plan for the influx of new Canadians.

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Regg Cohn: Canadians who seek justice in the Israel-Hamas war should choose their words — and their targets — very carefully

2023/11/13 Leave a comment

Of note. Money quote:

“We used to say that the world needs more Canada.

It can now be said that Canada does not need more Middle East — neither the madness nor the menace.”

Across Canada, protesters are raising their voices for their rival truths on both sides of the Middle Eastern divide. But two harsh realities await:

First, Canadians can’t stop the endless bloodshed in Gaza and Israel from here.

Second, they quite possibly can start a new conflict on the home front — pitting Canadians against Canadians on the streets of Toronto.

That would be the worst possible legacy of the latest war.

In Sunday’s Star, I wrote at length about the continuing war against peace, based on my own journalistic journey covering the front lines in Israel, Gaza, the West Bank and Lebanon. Today, the conflict is closer to home.

Tensions are rising here just as they are around the world, notably in European countries where antisemitism and Islamophobia are two sides of the same debased coin. The difference is that Canadians aren’t habituated to so much intolerance and incitement.

Today, demonization is the common denominator.

Antisemitism is being normalized. Islamophobia is being legitimized. And xenophobia is being Canadianized.

Please don’t close your eyes to it, for it is in plain sight. If you can’t feel it — in the air, on the streets and online — then you have lost all feeling.

In my last article, I described how far-right Jewish settlers and inciters undermined the peace process in Israel with an assassination and occupation; how Hamas and Islamic Jihad acted not merely as terrorists but rejectionists, blowing up the peace process with suicide bombs targeting civilians.

Never underestimate the ability of extremists and extreme voices on both sides to hijack the agenda — two tails wagging two warring dogs.

I worry that something similar is happening here in Canada — not with weapons of war, just the weaponizing of words. Some are using social media and megaphones to drive a wedge of division.

Debate is good and democratic. Protests are core to the fabric of freedom and petitions are part of our history.

However, hate speech isn’t protected — antisemitic or Islamophobic attacks can be prosecuted. When a synagogue is hit with Molotov cocktails in Montreal, or a mosque in Ottawa is smeared with feces, it’s against the law.

Small comfort. I worry as much or more about the rhetoric that is perfectly legal yet utterly hostile, if not inciteful.

I’m not pining for a country that bans harsh words or uncomfortable ideas. But it is painful when I see people validate or celebrate protests that devalue what their fellow Canadians hold dear.

I don’t expect every protester to be a model of modulation. I’m not counting on every social media monger to show moderation.

But when it feeds bigotry and bullying, we are moving into perilous territory. There’s a fine line between protesting for peace and provoking a war of words.

That line has been crossed in recent weeks.

Those protesters who seek justice should also show judgment — in choosing their words and their targets. When they criticize Israeli actions over there, and then single out Jewish Canadians over here, it sends a chill here at home that Jews everywhere are fair game.

When crowds chant outside the Jewish Community Centre at Bloor and Spadina (on their way back from a nearby protest), it transmits an unmistakably antisemitic signal across the city that Jews are somehow interchangeable with the Israeli consulate. When protesters yell slogans outside restaurants allegedly to call out Jewish or Israeli connections — intending only to intimidate and berate those trapped inside — it sends an ominous message across the country.

Boycotts are blunt instruments at the best of times. This is the worst of times.

Shall our universities ban books or appearances by bestselling Israeli historian Yuval Noah Harari, one of his country’s harshest social critics, because of his origins? Should Canada follow the lead of Lebanon and other Arab countries in banning Wonder Woman movies because its leading woman, Gal Gadot, is Israeli?

Beware such sophistry, for it is a slippery slope.

Obviously it is possible to criticize Israel without being antisemitic — as I did and I do. It is also possible to be anti-Zionist without being anti-Jewish — though it is not as simple as it sounds.

For if Zionism is truly racism, and Israel is transparently racist, would we say the same of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan — carved out as the explicit homeland for Muslims during the 1947 partition of the subcontinent, a place where blasphemy still triggers a death sentence and church bombings remain rampant?

Polling shows most Canadian Jews are broadly supportive of Zionism and the existence of Israel (setting aside illegal settlements). So it is hardly surprising that chanting Zionism is racism, or that Israel is an abomination — and calling for its elimination — would raise alarm bells (just as attacking Ukraine’s right to self-determination would trigger anxiety among Canadians with family ties to that country).

Righteous sloganeering is the wrong way to bring people together. Without humility, there is no empathy.

We have already seen violent and hateful incidents in Canada and the U.S. against Jews and Muslims. We have already heard people claiming that pro-Palestinian protesters should be doxxed or deported for speaking out, or listened as Canadian Jews were accused of dual loyalties for having strong opinions.

Instead of reaching out across the divide and joining hands, too many Jews and Muslims can only see themselves as the bigger victim — oblivious to the other — both in the Middle East and now in Canada. But in any competition for victimhood, there are no victors — it doesn’t work over there, and it won’t help over here.

It is not too late for Canadians to regain their footing, recover their balance, reclaim their compass. But we all need better filters.

Campus excesses are today magnified by social media and then amplified by mass media — distorting the dialogue further. An echo chamber has been transformed into a boxing ring where people take their best shots to provoke the worst instincts among cheering throngs.

Instead of joining hands, we have moved to finger-pointing and flag-waving. I wince when I see the Israeli and Palestinian flags affixed to cars whose drivers honk furiously for their rival tribe or team — as if this deadly conflict were a World Cup soccer competition for the loudest fans.

In a world of conflict and ignorance, Canada can remain a country of coexistence and tolerance. At a time of political polarization, Canadians must show the path to pluralism and remain a role model for multiculturalism.

I wake up with a heavy heart when I think of the bloodshed across the Middle East now — as I did in the past for the hundreds of thousands of souls that have died in the countries I’ve covered as a foreign correspondent. But when I wake these days to what is slowly unravelling in Canada, I hear unmistakable echoes — and yes, echo chambers — from my time abroad.

Which makes my heart even heavier.

We used to say that the world needs more Canada.

It can now be said that Canada does not need more Middle East — neither the madness nor the menace.

Source: https://www.thestar.com/politics/political-opinion/canadians-who-seek-justice-in-the-israel-hamas-war-should-choose-their-words-and-their/article_8b42ba0a-ee70-59cb-9a40-7125c887c51d.html

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Le rapport sénatorial sur l’islamophobie est le fruit d’une intoxication idéologique

2023/11/13 Leave a comment

The Quebec laicité perspective on the recent Senate report:

Irresponsable ? Catastrophiste ? Incendiaire ? On hésite sur le bon adjectif à utiliser pour décrire le rapport sur l’islamophobie que le Comité sénatorial permanent des droits de la personne (CSPDP) vient de déposer.

Les attentats à la mosquée de Québec et de London ont profondément bouleversé les Canadiens. Tous les crimes haineux mentionnés dans le rapport sont inacceptables, et les gouvernements ont la responsabilité de les combattre et doivent tout mettre en oeuvre pour favoriser la coexistence pacifique et la sécurité de leurs citoyens. Mais amplifier indûment la menace en dépeignant un climat de terreur pour les musulmans canadiens ne peut que nuire davantage. Les chiffres de Statistique Canada infirment d’ailleurs cette thèse alarmiste. Pourquoi taire, par exemple, que les populations noire et juive sont, et de loin, davantage victimes de crimes haineux ?

Ce rapport, s’il suggère bien quelques rares mesures raisonnables, préfère brosser un tableau hideux et sans nuances de la situation des musulmans canadiens. Ils se sentiraient attaqués, des femmes et des filles auraient « peur de quitter leur domicile pour aller au travail et à l’école », certains subiraient même de l’islamophobie tous les jours.

Définition, laïcité et idéologie

C’est que la définition proposée de l’islamophobie est très large afin d’englober le plus de cas possible. Par exemple, le fait de ne pas accorder aux musulmans, dans le milieu de travail, des locaux et du temps pour les prières est considéré comme relevant de l’islamophobie, au sens de racisme antimusulman (p. 66). L’approche intersectionnelle, comme les notions d’islamophobie systémique et de micro-agressions inconscientes, permet également d’amplifier le phénomène.

Le rapport reconduit également une compréhension hautement caricaturale de la Loi sur la laïcité de l’État. Les témoins interrogés, qui confondent le respect des personnes avec le respect absolu des préceptes de l’islam, « s’entendent tous pour dire que la loi 21 est discriminatoire, qu’elle a exacerbé l’islamophobie et qu’elle devrait être abrogée » (p. 65). Elle est même accusée de « déshumaniser les personnes ». On le voit, le CSPDP n’a pas entendu comme témoin un seul des nombreux musulmans qui soutiennent la loi 21.

Le rapport évite également de penser la réalité de l’islamisme violent et la peur légitime qu’il soulève, y compris chez les musulmans. Seul Rachad Antonius, parmi les 138 témoins entendus lors des 21 séances publiques, ose en traiter expressément, mais le rapport le passera sous silence. Il n’y aurait, à entendre les autres témoins, que des préjugés et des stéréotypes à combattre à grands coups de campagnes médiatiques et de formations obligatoires contre les biais inconscients pour tous les fonctionnaires et les élèves.

Le rapport ne retient que ce qui appuie une conclusion tirée d’avance. Tout écart statistique, comme la sous-représentation des musulmans chez les fonctionnaires ou leur surreprésentation dans les prisons, est compris comme une « preuve » d’islamophobie systémique, sans qu’il y ait recherche d’une explication plus plausible. Le rapport confond également idéologie et science en prétendant, sans justification, que « la plus grande menace pour la sécurité nationale provient des groupes militant pour la suprématie blanche » (p. 50). On taira donc un document sur la stratégie antiterroriste du Canada qui précisait pourtant que « l’extrémisme islamique violent est la principale menace pour la sécurité nationale du Canada » .

Une offensive contre les institutions chargées de la sécurité

Ce sont assurément les instances responsables de la sécurité nationale qui hantent ce rapport. Cinq des 13 recommandations y sont d’ailleurs consacrées, mais vont dans le sens opposé à celui qu’on attend de la part d’un comité sénatorial crédible. C’est que ce dernier semble surtout à la remorque des recommandations du Conseil national des musulmans canadiens (CNMC), contre lesquelles nous faisions déjà une mise en garde ici.

Le CNMC ne réclame en effet rien de moins que l’interruption de la stratégie nationale de lutte contre l’extrémisme violent et la radicalisation, et la suspension de la Division de la revue et de l’analyse (DRA) de l’Agence de revenu du Canada (ARC), qui est chargée de repérer les menaces de financement du terrorisme au Canada qui s’exercent par l’entremise d’organisations caritatives. Il propose plutôt que soient scrutés les organismes de sécurité nationale, dont le Service canadien du renseignement de sécurité, et les services frontaliers du Canada, qu’il soupçonne de pratiques racistes, xénophobes, islamophobes et même de subir la « pénétration de la suprématie blanche ».

Le CSPDP approuve tout cela et affirme que « les lois, les politiques et les pratiques relatives à la sécurité nationale sont profondément ancrées dans l’islamophobie et continuent de perpétuer des préjugés à l’encontre des musulmans » (p. 51). La preuve ? Soixante-quinze pour cent des révocations d’associations caritatives posant le plus grand risque de financement du terrorisme au Canada visaient des organismes musulmans, alors que ceux-ci représentent moins de 1 % de l’ensemble des organisations caritatives (p. 57). Malgré le témoignage de Sharmila Khare (directrice générale de la Direction des organismes de bienfaisance de l’ARC), selon lequel « les vérifications de la DRA ne sont entreprises que lorsqu’il y a un risque d’abus terroriste », le rapport conclut néanmoins que la DRA « fait preuve d’un parti pris structurel à l’encontre des organismes de bienfaisance musulmans » (p. 58).

Le simple fait que le modèle d’évaluation du ministère des Finances soit axé sur le risque serait même, selon le professeur de droit Anver Emon, « une déclaration explicite d’islamophobie » . Mieux, qu’un Canadien voyageant à Gaza et combattant pour le Hamas devienne suspect pour le gouvernement serait, ajoute-t-il, un « exemple d’islamophobie systémique » ! Faut-il vraiment relever que le CSPDP perd ainsi toute crédibilité en « oubliant » que le Hamas est sur la liste des entités terroristes du Canada ? Qu’en amalgamant islam et islamisme violent sous le parapluie de l’islamophobie, il mine le sentiment de sécurité de ses citoyens ?

Comment expliquer pareille intoxication irresponsable ? Une partie de l’explication réside peut-être dans le fait que la présidente de ce comité sénatorial, Salma Ataullahjan, est toujours conseillère au CNMC. Rappelons, pour finir, que cette organisation fait partie des plaignants qui sont devant les tribunaux pour faire invalider la loi 21.

Source: Le rapport sénatorial sur l’islamophobie est le fruit d’une intoxication idéologique

Neutral coverage below:

Islamophobia remains a persistent problem in Canada and concrete action is required to reverse the growing tide of hate, says a new Senate report released Thursday.

“The evidence is clear. Islamophobia is an acute threat to Canadian Muslims and urgent action is needed,” Sen. Salma Ataullahjan, chair of the Senate human rights committee, told reporters Thursday.

“We must commit to building a more inclusive country and to better promoting our Muslim relatives and friends, neighbours and colleagues.”

The report, the first of its kind in Canada, took a year and involved 21 public meetings and 138 witnesses.

The report said the committee “was disturbed to hear that incidents of Islamophobia are a daily reality for many Muslims, that one in four Canadians do not trust Muslims and that Canada leads the G7 in terms of targeted killings of Muslims motivated by Islamophobia.”

The report’s finding that one in four Canadians do not trust Muslims comes from a submission to the committee from Maple Lodge Farms, a supplier of Halal meat in Ontario’s Peel region, which said it gathered the information from a “national survey” it conducted of 1,500 Canadians.

The submission does not provide details on how the respondents were chosen or what specific questions they were asked.

The report found that Muslim women have become the “primary targets when it comes to violence and intimidation” because they are easily recognizable from their attire. As a result, many are afraid to leave their homes for work, school or other activities.

“The profound effects of gendered Islamophobia are such that it compels certain women to consider removing their hijabs to enhance their employment opportunities,” the report said.

“Testimonies highlighted the fact that Islamophobia in the workplace is not merely the consequence of a handful of people’s actions; rather, it is a systemic issue that is widespread.”

The report said that as a result, Arab women have the highest unemployment rate of any demographic group in the country.

Sen. Mobina Jaffer, Canada’s first Muslim senator, told reporters Thursday that in 2001, not long after 9/11, she was flying from Vancouver to Ottawa with about 60 members of her family when she and her husband were singled out by airport authorities.

“Coming from a refugee background to be appointed by [former prime minister Jean] Chrétien to be a senator was a great pride for my family,” Jaffer said. “And my husband and I both were called outside. And my husband and I both had to completely undress … and I don’t wish that on anybody.”

‘A confirmation of what we have been seeing over many years’

Uthman Quick, the director of communications for the National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM), told CBC News that the council was satisfied to see the report highlight the poor treatment of Muslim women in Canada, which he said is a growing problem.

“I think the report is really a confirmation of what we have been seeing over many years, but particularly over the last few weeks, since October 7,” he said.

Quick said there has been an increase in the number of Islamophobic incidents reported to the NCCM since the starte of the recent conflict between Israel and Hamas, a group designated as a terrorist organization by the Canadian government and other nations.

“I am hoping the recommendations are followed through upon. Now more than ever, we can see that they are absolutely needed,” Quick said.

Islamophobia and the media

The report said that the problem can be blamed in part on negative and pervasive stereotypes of Muslims the report said have mischaracterized “concepts of sharia, jihad and hijab.”

“The recurring portrayal of Muslims in media has entrenched these stereotypes, leading them to become falsely accepted as truth,” the report said.

The report found that hate-based information being spread on social media remains a growing problem, with more than 3,000 anti-Muslim social media groups or websites active in Canada.

“The frequency of hate speech and misinformation on social media platforms such as Facebook, X (formerly Twitter) and Instagram was a common concern for [committee] witnesses,” the report said.

A written submission to the committee from Meta, Instagram and Facebook’s parent company, said its efforts to combat Islamophobia are a “work in progress.” It said it is taking steps that include monitoring hate speech and engaging with Muslim communities.

Representatives from X did not appear or make a submission to the committee.

Recommendations

The report makes a number of recommendations for the federal government:

  • Ensure mandatory, regular training on Islamophobia for all federal government employees and the judiciary.
  • Launch a multimedia campaign and educational resources on Islamophobia that can be incorporated into classrooms.
  • Provide additional money to address hate-motivated crimes.
  • Increase specific Criminal Code offences for hate-motivated crimes.
  • Review the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission’s mandate to ensure it reflects the needs, interests and aspirations of racialized communities.
  • Introduce legislation to crack down on online hate.
  • Review national security legislation to ensure it takes Islamophobia into account.
  • Modernize the Employment Equity Act to ensure it takes Islamophobia into account.

The report also recommended the federal government introduce legislation in a number of areas to help the Canada Revenue Agency better understand the context for audits of religious organizations and provide quicker decisions on appeals.

The report said that in 2021, 144 anti-Muslim hate crimes were reported to police across the country, with an additional 1,723 crimes reported that were motivated by racial or ethnic hatred.

According to Statistics Canada data used to write the report, there were 223,000 reported cases of hate crime in general in 2020, but the report said those numbers fail to provide a complete picture of hate-motivated violence against Muslims in the country.

Mohammed Hashim, executive director of the Canadian Race Relations Foundation, is quoted in the report telling the committee that only one per cent of reported hate crimes are reported to police and only a fraction of those result in charges.

“Muslims in Canada feel like they are under attack. The psychological impact of constant fear and vigilance is a heavy burden,” the report said.

“Survivors of violent Islamophobia live with the trauma of their direct experience, while countless others live with vicarious trauma brought on by justified fear that their communities are not safe.”

Source: Senate report on Islamophobia says urgent action needed to reverse rising tide of hate

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